Albin Aahs

How did you first hear about Rize?

Albin is a cybersecurity major at St. Michael's College who came to the U.S. from Sweden with limited IT background but a strong interest in technology and problem-solving. A friend studying cybersecurity spoke highly of the field, which resonated with Albin's long-held dream of protection work and shifted his original goal of becoming a police officer to pursuing online protection through cybersecurity. The asynchronous format was particularly valuable as an international student-athlete balancing Alpine skiing, academics, and campus involvement.

How did you apply your Rize skills outside of the classroom?

Albin secured an internship with St. Michael's IT department, a role created specifically for him after discussing options with his advisor. He says "The three Rize courses I've had have done a very good job of preparing me for it, especially through the labs."

In his role, Albin uses Microsoft Sentinel to analyze security alerts, investigating suspicious sign-in attempts and comparing incidents against logs to detect threats. "That's what I learned a lot during the final project last year in Introduction to Cybersecurity, where we went through log analysis in Splunk, which is pretty much what I'm doing now, just in another system."

He's also become skilled at identifying false positives to help the small IT team focus on genuine threats. "Becoming better at seeing the patterns of what is normal and what is not normal" allows him to "quickly label the false positives, so you get them out of the way, to focus on the actual real suspicious activity." Due to the robust labeling process that he helped to implement, Albin was able to quickly deescalate a security incident when a professor fell victim to a phishing attack and over 1,000 fraudulent emails were sent to students.

How did this experience impact your career trajectory?

The internship confirmed Albin was on the right path by adding a new dimension to his education: a genuine sense of purpose and fulfillment that came from solving real problems and helping real people. After years of building foundational knowledge through coursework, he finally saw how it all connected. Watching his Rize skills translate into protecting people's information and keeping systems secure showed him that cybersecurity wasn't just about technical expertise—it was about helping people live safer lives. "You have some responsibility, and you're actually looking out for the system and other people, which gives you a sense of purpose... It's just proven to me that I'm definitely on the right trajectory."

What's next for you?

Albin hopes to continue at St. Michael's IT department in a dedicated security-focused role after his internship ends in December, noting the department lacks someone specifically monitoring security threats. For next summer, he's actively searching for security analyst internships back home in Sweden and he continues to work ahead in his Rize courses so that he can dedicate more time to the internship work that he is passionate about.